AND A LOOK AT THE PAST!
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Sports, Dual Sport Motorcycle Riding, Politics, Nostalgia, Music, Photography, and a Healthy Dose of BS....

Monday, September 17, 2012

Kokono and Beyond....

Lot's of action in the world going on, and I could wax and whine about that...

Our Illegal Kenyan Marxist fool of a President, lying through his teeth about the murders in the Middle East...but that son of a bitch will pay for his crimes, sooner or later, if not in this life, in the afterlife...I'd like to be there when God takes care of this bastard...

My Football game on Friday, where underdog St. Henry took on #5 ranked Minster and came from behind to pull off a 35-21 upset...

The Reds moving closer by the day to clinching the NL Central....or even the Bengals knocking off the Browns for the 13 time in the last 16 games in the battle of Ohio....

But I will instead talk about the 48 hours last week in Howard County, Indiana, at the 30th annual Vietnam Veterans Reunion, just outside of Kokomo.

Kokomo's 30th and my 3rd____I headed out early Wednesday morning and rolled through the little used state and back roads of east central Indiana....Greentown, Indiana, or at least a large farm field near Greentown and Kokomo, was the point I had logged in on my Tom-Tom GPS. I was familiar with the route, little has changed since I worked as morning News Anchor at WIOU Radio back in 1979 and 80. Frankly, I didn't really like Kokomo as a place to reside, probably why I didn't stick around long at WIOU. The General Manager boss was an asshole, the Program Director was a drunken fool, and most that worked there were ass kissing leftist, the owners at Booth Broadcasting, out of Detroit where fools....the city itself? Well let's just say, the majority of people where not on my short list of people I would hang around with....but that was then, here we are some 30 years later, and these people that I had met, from both the Kokomo area and elsewhere were my kind of people.

I arrived at the site and quickly found the Boar's Nest, where I would camp....Tom McCandless the "Mayor", along with Big Sam Lewis, Larry, and the rest were already set up, they had been there since the previous Sunday, and would stay for the week....I would, for the second straight year, stay 48 hours...maybe next year, if we all are still kicking, I will increase that to 4 days, maybe!The two day stay came down to this for me.....Day #1 Bullshitting with the gang, drinking some homemade Moonshine of various flavors, more bullshitting, more "shine", and then heading over to where Charlie and the Gang would be spinning disks for the remainder of the night....there I would drink a little shine, a few beers, smoke a cigar, and finally wander back to the Nest about 1:30 in the morning....sleeping in the back of the van, having, but not needing my zero degree sleeping bag.

Day #2 consisted, getting rid of my hangover, which wasn't bad, more bullshitting, greeting others that I had not seen so far, including fellow VSPA members, John, Tony, and Phil, several others would arrive after I left on Friday at Noon, maybe next year. That was followed by more BSing, and just a sip of shine, and a beer or two, but really not much drinking at all. We avoided the entertainment tent, instead opting heading over to Bill's tent where he had his 60 inch projection TV set up...we watched the old Lee Marvin/Ernie Borgnine movie, "Emperor of the North". And by 10:30 I was in the tent this night, sleeping it off.

Day #3 would be short, and the rain greeted us about 4 in the morning...it stayed as Sam and I headed into Kokomo for more groceries and goods...I would say my final "Good-Byes" with a promise to stay 4 days next year...just not sure how that will work around football season, but Monday through Friday is a possibility, or perhaps Wednesday through Saturday, with taking Friday Night off and letting someone take my place on that night's game....I will work something out, if Obama hasn't jailed us by then.In the meantime, I have already made plans to return to the ground for next year's "Mini Reunion", which takes place the first weekend of June.....meanwhile I have the photos to share....Football tonight here in Celina with a Freshman contest.....and a follow up doctor's appointment on schedule for Wednesday....back later>>>>Photos-The Official Orange Patch of the Boar's Nest...(2) The Drink of Choice at the Reunion, "Moonshine" of varying flavors...I think I finished off most of this jar of Mandarin Orange in the first afternoon. (3) "Sweetie Pie" our mascot after being rescued by Tom McCandless, seems Sweetie was doing the rounds with a few interlopers on Wednesday Night{note the Bud Light in her mouth, er snout} (4) Big Sam Lewis, at 6' 6" being dwarfed in the larger than life size camp chair....and Butch Meilinger and me with cigars and "shine". Butch was a Sniper in Vietnam, and a World Record Holder in Big Game in Africa and North America, with both gun and Cross Bow, Butch is from Wind Gap, Pennsylvania, and what makes it a even smaller world, we found out last year that Butch's wife and I had been classmates in tiny Venice, Florida, back in the 1950s and early 60s at Venice Elementary....small world indeed. You can see Butch's game and hunting site here:www.huntwithbutch.com